I Remember You
by Maahiyum
Summary: Kisame x TenTen request from JenKonoha After Itachi's death, Kisame wanders during a solo mission and stumbles upon TenTen...
1. Chapter 1

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**So this was originally meant to be a oneshot for one of my best reviewers: JenKonoha who wanted a KisaTenTen story since there aren't enough good ones. And well, what do you know, I always choose to support the most cracked of pairings --  
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**but in my effort to make it a 'good' oneshot, I went a little overboard, and this story is no longer a oneshot.**

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**I Remember You...**

Chapter 1

Kisame felt old.

With a soft sigh, he watched the sun set as he took a moment of silence for his impeccably silent comrade's death. This was it. There would be no more waiting around patiently for Itachi to be ready to leave. There would be nobody around to answer his stupid questions. He knew he shouldn't have left him alone, but he wasn't one to question the older Uchiha heir.

Now he would be doing everything solo. No more partner. He was sure that Pein would be able to find him another partner, but Kisame was sure that nobody would be able to replace his diseased companion.

Why? Because Kisame knew something about himself and he knew something about Itachi. He knew that, while he himself wasn't the brightest and even-tempered of shinobi, Itachi was always patient, calm, and collected with him. Kisame was positive that he would never meet someone like that again.

With a short, rusty laugh, he tossed a pebble into the darkening horizon.

"Well, Itachi…it was great knowing you, but I was pretty damn sure that I'd be going first."

Deftly, he grabbed Samehada from the rocks next to him as he got to his feet and left to begin his first solo mission.

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TenTen leaned back against a tree and exhaled in relief. She really couldn't go on any longer. She just had to stop for the night. She had only enough chakra for a handful of emergency jutsus. Shutting her eyes, she heightened her senses for anyone or anything else in the vicinity. She couldn't sense anyone, and all she could hear was the gentle murmer of a nearby stream.

Slowly, she got up and made her way towards the stream to set up camp. A faint, fatigued smile played across her lips as she swung her pack to the ground and crouched down to touch the water. The summer night was warm, but the water definitely wasn't. Crouching down, she dipped her hands in and scooped some up to her parched lips. Once she had had enough, she splashed her face to get rid of the day's sweat and dirt.

She let out a sigh of contentment and as the water ran down her face. She didn't bother opening her eyes until all of it was gone. Unfortunately, when she did, he entire world changed.

She saw a pair of blue shinobi feet. She didn't have to look any further to simply _feel_ a blade aimed at her head. She wasn't a weapons mistress for nothing.

Tenten started sweating on the outside and whimpering like a scared child on the inside. She slowly lifted her head up to meet the shinobi's face. She had to crane her neck even more when she realized that he was a lot taller then your average man. She found his head, or where it was supposed to be at least, since it was only a dark blur surrounded by a menacing white light as he stood in front of the moon.

_I don't want to die! I don't want to die! I'm too young to die!_ Tenten involuntarily whispered this mantra in her head. Her face was flushed from the humidity and her eyes were as wide as saucers because of her fear. She was sure that her eyes were watering from looking at the dark figure in front of the moon so intensely for so long. In retrospect, she must have looked rather cherubic and cute, but this was a life and death situation, she thought, those were the thoughts furthest from her mind at the moment.

Then she heard a gruff sigh and the blade (or was it blades? She couldn't tell in the lighting) was moved away from it's position above her head.

"This is the first time that I've seen too much death in my life. You're lucky I'm not in the mood today, kid." Words used by many experienced shinobi resounded around her. The calloused voice overpowering her rapid pulse in her ears.

Tenten's last breath was frozen in her lungs. She gave the briefest of nods and slowly backed away towards her belongings. She couldn't believe it. For one thing, the shinobi had just let her go and for another, she was so drained from this stupid mission that she didn't even get the adrenaline rush people normally get during life and death situations like this. How disappointing that her own body was beginning to malfunction. She had to get away from here. She had to get away NOW. She had some sort of cruel luck to run into an unknown (probably missing) nin who just happened to not be in the mood to kill. If she came across another nin in her weak state, he or she would likely not let he go as easily.

"What are you doing? Get back here."

Tenten paused. Her foot was still half-way in the air as she was about to step over some brush. She squeezed her eyes tight and cursed her twisted fate. Moving stiffly, she put her foot back down and turned around to face the unknown shinobi. She found him to be seated under one of the nearby trees, backed against the trunk. She couldn't tell for sure but either he was traveling with very large objects or he was spread very languidly under there.

And that's when it hit her. Obviously, kunoichi in her situation were never allowed to leave freely. Their captors always asked for other _favors_. As she inched her way towards the man, her body trembled and it took all of her willpower to keep the tremor out of her voice as she tried to reason,

"Why do I need to stay? I don't know who you are, I won't tell anyone you were here."

"I didn't say that you could leave, kid. Only that I wouldn't kill you." His voice sounded worn out but he was firm in what he said, "just sit down somewhere so I can see you."

Tenten breathed a sigh of relief as she dragged her pack to a tree a couple meters away from the shinobi. She flopped down with a huff and stretched her legs out in front of her as she leaned her head back against the tree. She was absolutely dead tired. All she wanted to do was go to sleep. But she couldn't knowing that there was an enemy shinobi nearby. She groaned and rubbed her head as she watched a few scattered stars twinkle between the branches above.

There was simply no way she could fall asleep.

Tenten yawned and immediately clamped her hand over her mouth and shook her head to keep sleep at bay. She cast a glance at the Akatsuki, expecting him to be watching her, but to her surprise, he was dong no such thing. In fact, she was sure that he was absently…petting? The giant object that lay across his lap. She peered closer, but from the distance, couldn't see his face obscured under the shadows. His posture didn't seem to look very threatening any more. She relaxed a little.

Tenten yawned again but this time it was greater then before. She stretched her jaw to it's capacity, and a small noise unconsciously came from the back of her throat. Her eyes widened at her very un-ladylike noise that caused Kisame to look up mildly curious, but she was too tired to feel mortified of herself as she immediately began repeating a new mantra in her head.

_I'm not going to fall asleep. I'm not going to fall asleep. I'm not going to fall asleep. Not when there's an enemy shinobi present. I can't fall asleep._

She felt the bark on the tree mildly bite into her back as she let more and more of her weight fall onto the trunk. The slight pain did nothing to keep her eyes from drooping. Her sheer exhaustion was beginning to take over her willpower to stay awake.

_I'm not going to fall asleep _said a small corner of her mind that was still conscious and alert and very angry as she promptly fell asleep with her head tilted back, mouth slightly open, and a hand clutching a kunai lying limp across her lap.

The corner of Kisame's mouth quirked up in a morose smirk. He had known the entire time that the kunoichi had no chakra left whatsoever, but he had to commend her for at least trying to stay awake. He had no idea why he'd made her stay since he hadn't killed her. He wasn't one to take captives, since it was usually Itachi that did that, Itachi consequently did all the thinking in their partnership as well. Kisame racked his brain for all he knew about taking captives. He didn't even know how to treat them besides giving them his usual scary grins along with threats of castration. But those usually went for the ones that the Leader wanted alive for one purpose or another. This time, it wasn't the Leader telling him to take a captive. This time, it was just Kisame, not in the mood to kill and not thinking about the consequences of not following that rule of thumb.

Kisame grimaced. What to do about the kunoichi now? He couldn't possibly let her go since she'd seen him around here. She would probably run to the nearest village and tell its _wonderful_ hunter nins that he was out and about. And it just so happened that the closest village was that of Stone and he'd already had a rather annoying run-in with them a week ago.

And he couldn't possibly drag her around with him until he went back to headquarters. Leader would be just a little affronted that Kisame had randomly picked up a kunoichi and brought her back for no reason or purpose to serve. Besides….she would slow him down. Well…he supposed the only choice he had left was to kill her, but that would have to wait until morning because slitting her throat at night just wasn't his style.

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**PLEASE REVIEW!! I don't know if there are many KisaTenTen readers out there, so the ones that do come across this, I'd like to know what you think.**


	2. Chapter 2

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As the sun's morning rays peeked over the tree tops, a tall form loomed over a sleeping kunoichi.

Kisame set a grim look on his face and pulled Samehada off his back. He was going to do it. He couldn't take her with her anywhere. There would just have to be one less kunoichi in the world.

He then raised Samehada up into the air above TenTen and brought it down hard.

The blade barely made a sound as it swiftly entered the soft earth right next to her neck. Kisame sighed and unearthed it slowly. The small sound of the dirt shifting caused the kunoichi's eyes to immediately fly open as she jumped into a defensive position, one hand wielding a kunai and the other poised over a weapons scroll, leaving Kisame standing under the trees shadows.

"Relax, kid. I didn't hurt you at all last night, what makes you think I'll do it now?" Kisame sighed as he placed the sword on his back again. TenTen eyed the giant sword, pointedly.

"That."

Kisame grinned lazily as he fondly ran his hand over his sword's handle.

"Yeah, Samehada here is lusting for blood. She always does."

"Sa-Samehada?" TenTen whispered the name as she slowly recognized it from somewhere. Then Kisame stepped out into the light. TenTen nearly dropped her kunai from the shock.

"You-You're one of the Swordsman of the Hidden Mist…" She was too shocked to jump out of the way as he stepped closer and she got a good look up at him and his tall frame.

"Hoshigaki Kisame, kid. And you are? Scared? Terrified? Too afraid to move?" Kisame pointed a long, pale blue finger at her nose as he gave her a forced grin. To him, this…her reaction was to be expected. He wasn't in the mood to play the whole macho act, especially since he had regretfully, not killed the girl, but he had to, for appearances' sake, right? What if Leader found out that he was being intentionally nice?

For TenTen, it took a moment before his words sunk in and her eyes flashed in anger as she flipped away from his degrading index finger.

"I-I'm not afraid of you! I'll fight you right now!" Being on the same team as Rock Lee had to have _some_ effect on her, right? She took up an offensive stance a couple yards away, with scrolls already aimed. As the adrenaline rushed through her body, memories of all her fights came back like a flash flood and she instantly recognized him as the one who fought Gai-sensei and nearly defeated him a while back. Kisame, on the other hand took one look at her and let out a short, bark-like laugh. He recognized her, too. She was the mousy girl that he'd trapped in one of his water bubbles along with two others. Then their oddly-dressed-in-green teacher (the tights didn't bother him as much as that particular shade of green did) battled him and his sharks.

"I remember you, kid. Your teacher was that green rubber band, right?"

"Gai-sensei might dress weird, but that gives no right to the likes of you to insult him!" TenTen shouted to keep herself focused (considering she didn't really care who made fun of Gai-sensei's clothes) as she prepared for her first attack with a flick of each wrist. She might be battling on a empty stomach, but an entire night's sleep had really rejuvenated her. And the inner panic she felt was helping, too.

"Put those away…you're already my prisoner." Kisame frowned at the multitude of kunai and shuriken flashing before him. TenTen's jaw dropped. Just what the heck was this fishy guy talking about?

"No I'm not! What are you talking about?!" She released the first barrage of tiny, sharp objects. In a split second, Kisame had flipped Samehada in front of him and deflected each one. He moved quite fast for a guy that tall lugging a sword that big.

"I'm talking about last night, kid! I officially took you as my prisoner!" Kisame's voice didn't loose its tempo at all. He'd barely put in any effort in deflecting her attack. He was hoping that she'd simply understand that she was his prisoner now if he explained it to her. He wasn't sure if there was any other way to go about it. WWID? What Would Itachi Do? According to past prisoners that the Akatsuki duo had taken, Itachi sometimes did and sometimes didn't tell their prisoners that they were prisoners. Most of the time, when the prisoner woke up and found himself bound and slung over Kisame's shoulder, he usually figured it out on his own.

"But we didn't even fight! How am I prisoner already?! I haven't lost to you!" TenTen argued boldly as she jumped up and let glinting spears rain down on Kisame. Kisame swung Samehada around above him and jumped away.

"Kid! You've already lost! Now put your toys away!" Kisame cracked a smile at his own lame joke. TenTen looked at him strangely from across the clearing.

"No!" She had to get away from this guy. Just who did he think he was? Telling her that she had already lost when the fight had just begun …oh yeah…Akatsuki…She grabbed another scroll and began to do one of her specialty dragon attacks by rapidly twirling and unfurling her scrolls simultaneously. Kisame groaned. He just didn't have time for this. He had to get this mission done and he had no time to waste exercising like this. He rubbed his brow in annoyance and before she knew it, he had broken through her rapid spin and hovered directly behind her. TenTen's eyes widened in surprise and before she could jump away, he lifted her up by the back of her shirt.

"Now listen. I'm hungry. I want breakfast. And according to last night, I'm sure you do too. I'm going to find something to eat, and you're coming with me." He turned her around to face him and waited for a response. At first, she looked awestruck and her mouth hung open a little before she let her head drop in a quiet acceptance. She silently wept on the inside for her diminishing intelligence and weakness. She obviously valued her life more then her dignity. Besides, no one she knew was around to see her like this….right? So she could play along as prisoner for now, and escape later.

Now that she had stopped moving, her stomach gurgled rather loudly, yearning for sustenance. The insects stopped buzzing, the birds stopped chirping, and the wildlife stopped skittering around. The only sound in the area came from one source. She stared in mortification at her stomach and Kisame, who was still holding her up, also stared at her stomach before letting out a raucous laugh and setting her down. Giving her a heavy pat on the back, he told her to grab her stuff so they could get going. She nodded glumly and followed beside him as they trekked through the forest, glancing up at the menacing sword of legend every now and then.

TenTen seemed to have a dark cloud of depression hanging over her. She didn't even wonder about _how_ she got _into_ this situation, because what's done is done. She was more worried about _how_ to get _out_ of this situation. Between her hunger pangs, trying to keep up with her taller…._companion's_ pace, and trying not to trip over the scattered tree roots and rocks, coming up with a plan to escape was very, very difficult. Whenever she tried to come up with a plan, all she had to do was to try and find the top of Kisame's blue head. The red and black clad figure was nearly twice as tall as her with a sword that matched. Upon seeing it, all of her revolutionary fire would be instantly extinguished as if Kisame had up and Suiton-jutsu'd her into the next century.

Even though it had only been about seven minutes or so since they'd begun traveling, TenTen finally gave in to her natural inquisitiveness and asked,

"Where are we going?" She had carelessly used the word 'we' because of the lack-lustre state of mind she was in…that and because her conscience wouldn't let her phrase it as 'Where are _you_ going?' for that 'you' would mean that she had agreed to being his prisoner, which she hadn't.

"…huh? Did you say something?" Apparently, Kisame was so high up there that he couldn't hear her. Mentally cringing, she repeated herself more clearly and loudly then before. Maybe a little too loudly. Kisame winced and tugged at his earlobe.

"You don't need to shout, kid. I'm not across the country or anything. You just need to stop mumbling. We're only heading to the nearest town to grab some grub."

"…oh…town." TenTen mumbled to herself before realizing just what was going on. "T-Town?!"

"Yeah…town." Kisame looked at her curiously. She seemed to be hyperventilating.

"Breathe, TenTen! Breathe!" she told herself and she stood there, images of her future flashing before her eyes. She could see it now, how everyone she knew would react if she was taken prisoner by a member of Akatsuki…it would be even better when they found out that the two were waltzing through a town grabbing breakfast. Oh, the indignity and the shame! She wouldn't be able to show her face in town again! What kind of kunoichi would she be? That is….if she ever got out of this situation in the first place.

_Think, TenTen! Think!_

"Y-You can't go into town!" She said to Kisame.

"Eh? I know I look a little different, but I can blend in perfectly…" Kisame had no idea what she was going at. He had hoped that she would some how escape once in they made it to town so that that way, Leader wouldn't get mad at him for letting a prisoner go. But he was a little confused since any sane prisoner would stroll willingly into town because that would increase his chances of escaping or being rescued…but this girl…what was she trying to do? Remain a prisoner? He didn't want that any more then she did, he just couldn't tell her because then he'd be admitting to breaking the rules of Akatsuki.

"No…ummm…actually…." TenTen dropped to her knees and began rummaging through her pack, "There's no need….I have a few rations right here…" Her hand shook as she held a riceball up to him. She had completely forgotten that she had food in her pack until now. Kisame stared at it a second, trying to figure out what to do next. Food was the best excuse he could come up with for them to get to town so she could 'accidentally' escape, but what was he going to do now?

"Thanks, kid." He said slowly as he grabbed the meager sustenance from her and chomped down. When he took it from her, TenTen nearly reared back but forced herself to stay still. She watched him as he took his time eating the riceball. With every bite he took, she saw a sharp row of teeth glint from beneath his lips. She was surprised that he was eating so civilly for a man that held an uncanny resemblance to a shark. She finally grabbed a riceball for herself and dug in.

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**What? I know I'm making them completely OOC but you have to understand that Kisame doesn't want to have a prisoner and TenTen has a slightly different set of priorities then your average joe**. Besides...it's fanfiction

**Leave a review if you have any questions, comments, or concerns.**


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